By 2001, abysmal employee morale and unsafe working conditions had soured the reputation of the Campbell Soup Company. The century-old colossus, whose iconic cans appear in 90% of American households, had the lowest employee engagement of any Fortune 500 company. Enter a new CEO who forms a truly engaged leadership team and turns the toxic workplace around – in just three years.
Chances are when you hear someone say Campbell's, you think of soup.
You probably have a favorite, too.
My favorite was tomato rice soup.
My favorite is tomato bisque.
My favorite is the chunky italian wedding.
Soup with a record minus tomato with grilled cheese dipped into it.
Just unreal.
The Campbell's brand is strong.
The company is over 100 years old.
And, I mean, Andy Warhol, right?
But despite all that, in 2001, Campbell's leadership had to pull its company from the brink of collapse from the inside.
Campbell had financially lost half of its market value in the prior three years.
So I think there was a sense of fear and anxiety, as well as questioning where the company was going.
And there was a reluctance on the part of management to acknowledge that they were in what a friend of mine used to call the circle of doom.
That fear, anxiety, and impending financial doom meant that Campbell's had the lowest employee engagement of any Fortune 500 company.
The environment was more toxic than I imagined.
Their solution was to hire a new CEO and task him with literally saving the company by figuring out some way to build back trust, loyalty, and engagement with Campbell's thousands of employees.
And he had three years to get it right.
If you go in as a CEO, most companies, especially what I'll call old economy, large consumer packaged goods companies, you have three years to get it right.
The first year, it's the other guy's fault.